Nowadays a personalized performance (e.g. simulating interaction as, for example, conversation, with a user to create an impression of a human presence, interactive educating presentations, etc.) is used for entertainment, marketing, education, medical and other purposes. Problems related to personalized performance have been recognized in prior art and various systems have been developed to provide a solution, for example:
U.S. Pat. No. 5,309,359 (Katz et al.) entitled “Method and apparatus for generating and utilizing annotations to facilitate computer text retrieval” discloses a method and apparatus for computer text retrieval which involves annotating at least selected text subdivisions, preferably with natural language questions, assertions or noun phrases. However, the annotations may also initially be generated in a structured form. Annotations are, if required, converted to a structured form and are stored in that form. Searching for relevant text subdivisions involves entering a query in natural language or structured form, converting natural language queries to structured form, matching the structured form query against stored annotations and retrieving text subdivisions connected to the matched annotations. The annotation process may be aided by utilizing various techniques for automatically or semi-automatically generating the annotations.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,884,302 (Ho) entitled “System and method to answer a question” discloses a database-processing method and system for answering a natural-language question by a computer system with a database. In one embodiment, the system analyzes the grammatical structure of the question. In the analysis, the system scans the question to extract each word in the question; then based on a pre-defined context-free grammatical structure, the question is parsed into its grammatical components using one or more grammar rules and the database. After parsing the question, the system transforms the components into one or more instructions, using one or more semantic rules and the database. The instructions, when executed, at least access data from the database for generating the answer to the natural-language question. In another embodiment, the system compares the natural-language question with questions stored in the database; each question in the database has its corresponding answer. If there is a match, the system retrieves the answer to the corresponding matched question and presents the answer to the student.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,314,410 (Tackett et al) entitled “System and method for identifying the context of a statement made to a virtual robot” discloses an automated interface program designed to interact and communicate with users, said program executing actions when a category among a predefined set of categories is activated. Also the patent discloses a method for interpreting the context of a user input, the steps of said method comprising: associating subjects with categories; maintaining a list of the subjects associated with the most recently activated category; testing conditions in categories such that the condition is true if comprises at least one subject in common with said list of subjects; and activating a set of categories, said set comprising those categories whose conditions are satisfied based on the list of subjects.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,418,440 (Kuo et al.) entitled “System and method for performing automated dynamic dialogue generation” discloses a method and apparatus for generating a human-machine dialogue comprising steps or modules for receiving a user request comprising at least one topic of interest; retrieving from an external database at a first point in time, a first set of documents comprising information relating to the at least one topic of interest; generating a human-machine dialogue based on the information comprised in said first set of documents; retrieving from the external database at a second point in time later than said first point in time, a second set of documents comprising information relating to the at least one topic of interest, the information comprised in said second set of documents having at least one difference from the information comprised in said first set of documents; and modifying the human-machine dialogue based on the information comprised in said second set of documents.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,430,602 (Hoffer et al.) entitled “Method and system for interactively responding to instant messaging requests” discloses a method and system for interactively responding to queries from a remotely located user, the system including a computer server configured to receiving an instant message query or request from the user over the Internet. The query or request is interpreted and appropriate action is taken, such as accessing a local or remote data resource and formulating an answer to the user's query. The answer is formatted as appropriate and returned to the user as an instant message or via another route specified by the user. A method and system of providing authenticated access to a given web page via instant messaging is also disclosed.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,721,706 (Strubbe et al) entitled “Environment-responsive user interface/entertainment device that simulates personal interaction” discloses an interaction simulator, such as a chatterbot, enabled to simulate an awareness of the user to generate an interaction. For example, the device may employ machine vision to detect the number of persons present or the activity of the user and respond accordingly by interrupting its output or by inviting a conversation or other interaction when a user approaches. The device may modify its responses according to the user's activity, for example, by playing music when the user falls asleep or requesting an introduction when another user speaks. The device may also respond to unrecognized changes in the situation by inquiring about what is going on to stimulate interaction or generate new responses.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,728,679 (Strubbe et al.) entitled “Self-updating user interface/entertainment device that simulates personal interaction” discloses an interaction simulator having the ability to dynamically update response templates and response data by retrieving current information from a data source. The interaction simulator may interact verbally or by other means such as gesture, typed text, or other means to generate a “dialogue”. The criteria used to create new response data can come from fixed specifications, for example, the current weather, or from the content of previous conversations (for example, the system creating a new template about a topic indicated by the user to be of interest to him/her).
U.S. Pat. No. 6,731,307 (Strubbe et al.) entitled “User interface/entertainment device that simulates personal interaction and responds to user's mental state and/or personality” discloses an interaction simulator using computer vision, and inputs of other modalities, to analyze the user's mental state and/or personality. The mental state and/or personality are classified, and this information is used to guide conversation and other interaction. In a chatterbot embodiment, the substance of the conversation may be altered in response to the mental state and/or personality class, for example, by changing the topic of conversation to a favorite subject when the user is sad or by telling a joke when the user is in a good mood.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,773,344 (Freeman et al.) entitled “Methods and apparatus for integrating interactive toys with interactive television and cellular communication systems” discloses interactive toys having real time conversations with users, preferably employing speech recognition. Interactive toys are preferably connected to at least one interactive toy server which is preferably connected to entertainment, education, sales promotion and other content providers possibly via Internet communication systems. Interactive toys further utilize user knowledge bases to match entertainment, education and sales promotion content to user histories, behaviors and habits. Content is thus personalized to an individual user as well as to a user's environment including the user's location and the time at which the toy is used. Integration of content, such as entertainment, education and sales promotion is provided by merging interactive television techniques with interactive toys.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,795,808 (Tackett et al.) entitled “User interface/entertainment device that simulates personal interaction and charges external database with relevant data” discloses an interaction simulator, such as a chatterbot, connected with an external database, such as an electronic program guide. The information gathered during interaction, particularly conversational, is parsed and used to augment the database data. The interaction simulator may be guided by the data residing in the database so as to help fill in recognizable gaps by, for example, intermittently asking questions relating to the subject data requirement. The interaction simulator may be provided with specific response templates based on the needs of the database and a corresponding set of templates to extract the information required by the database. Another example database may be for recording and indexing by key word stories or other free-form verbal data uttered by the user. The interaction simulator may be programmed to help the user develop the story using templates designed for this purpose.
US Patent Application 2002/59,045 (Tackett et al.) entitled “System and method for automatically focusing the attention of a virtual robot interacting with users” discloses a method for automatically verifying the performance of an automated interface program, the steps of said method comprising: specifying inputs under which the program should be tested; associating said inputs with conditions within categories in the program, each said condition comprising at least one response which could be given if said condition is satisfied; executing said program under at least one said input; determining whether the associated condition is satisfied upon said input; and determining whether the response associated with said condition is given upon said input. In another aspect of the present invention, the test inputs are embedded within the script itself, and specifically, within categories that can be automatically listed upon compilation of the script. Such a list of test inputs can then be automatically executed to test the program. The execution of a test input can be used to check whether the test input activated the category in which the test input is embedded. The response given upon execution of a test input can then determine whether other categories are erroneously activated; or whether inputs, other than the test input, erroneously activate the category associated with the test input
US Patent Application No. 2004/138,959 (Saruchashi et al.) entitled “Artificial intelligence platform” discloses a platform for authoring and deploying interactive characters powered by artificial intelligence. The platform permits the creation of a virtual world populated by multiple characters and objects, interacting with one another so as to create a life-like virtual world and interacting with a user so as to provide a more interesting and powerful experience for the user. This system can be used for entertainment purposes, for commercial purposes, for educational purposes, etc.
US Patent Application No. 2004/205,131 discloses an information communication service system in which multimedia contents such as moving images, still images, and text are registered in advance and are fetched when required with holding bidirectional conversation functions using multimedia information including TV pictures and sounds for providing conferences, education, medical care, nursing care, various consultations, and the like. The information communication service system comprises: a bidirectional communication server for conducting bidirectional multimedia communication; a contents management server for storing multimedia contents; and a contents delivery server for delivering the contents stored in the contents management server to user terminals. The contents management server has a contents archiver storing material contents, and performs delivery based on a scenario which defines a combination of material contents along the time axis. The bidirectional communication server also has a data conference function and a chat function. A resource management function and an accounting function are also provided.
International Application No. WO 2002/42,973 (Kang et al.) entitled “Apparatus and method for materializing interactive cyber seminar” discloses an apparatus and method able to perform an interactive multimedia presentation using realistic images and voices on the basis of a virtual reality modeling language (VRML), which is a virtual reality materialization tool. This apparatus comprises a seminar server for executing a certain mode to allow a publisher and listener to interactively participate in a multimedia seminar, a chatting server for providing chatting information in response to live data from the seminar server, a Web broad server for running a Web board in response to on-demand data from the seminar server, a media streaming server for providing media streaming data to the seminar server, and a database for storing personal information and seminar information of the listener and publisher. Web-cast images and voices can be utilized as interactive commodity, education, seminar and presentation data.
International Application No. WO 2005/122,526 (Suner) entitled “Interactive mobile on-line visual information and entertainment service” discloses a method of providing interactive, mobile, on-line, visual, information and entertainment service. For this purpose, the user accesses to a broadcast provided by a service or a contents provider over a mobile communications network. This broadcast is on pre-determined subjects and comprises live or pre-recorded, vocal or silent, motion pictures. The user gains access to this broadcast through his/her mobile communication device, e.g. mobile phone, and gains information, acquires education, benefits from consultancy, entertains, does business/shopping, etc., by choosing among said images, and by providing oral, visual and/or written interaction with the said motion pictures and/or the person on the broadcast, within the framework of a protocol determined by the service or the contents provider or depending on his/her own preferences.